The Military Importance of Naval Engineering Experiments: The Scope and Purpose of the Naval Engineering Laboratory to be Established at the Naval Academy

The act passed by Congress of the United States has authorized the building of a naval engineering laboratory to be established at the Naval Academy, whose cost, including equipment, should not exceed $400,000. Engineer-in-Chief B. F. Isherwood, U. S. N., carried on an extended and careful series of experiments in connection with the subject of screw propellers. The information secured at that time is standard authority today, but since then it has required persistent effort to arouse naval administrators to the importance of detailing ships and men for securing data upon questions relating to the action of the screw propeller. The museum of the laboratory should contain applications of all the different mechanical movements, every form of quick return motion, models of various systems of valve gear and linkages, special sets of Reuleaux models, elements of the principal forms of marine boilers, and various designs of steam turbines.